U.S. Pat. No. 4,629,676 (Hayakawa et al.) and EP-A-0 174 634 disclose a light-sensitive material comprising a support and a light-sensitive layer which contains silver halide, a reducing agent, a polymerizable compound and a color image forming substance. An image-forming method using the light-sensitive material comprises: imagewise exposing to light the material to form a latent image of silver halide; and heating the material to form a polymer image within the area where the latent image has been formed.
U.S. patent application Ser. No. 06/854,640, which was continued as Ser. No. 07/113,346, which was further continued as Ser. No. 07/294,977, which is now allowed and issued as U.S. Pat. No. 5,166,040 (Takeda) and EP-A-0 202 490 disclose another image forming method in which a polymer image is formed within the area where a latent image has not been formed
U.S. Pat. No. 4,912,011 (Yamamoto et al.) and EP-A-0 203 613 disclose a light-sensitive material containing light-sensitive microcapsules. Silver halide, a reducing agent, a polymerizable compound and a color image forming substance are contained in the microcapsules which are dispersed in the light-sensitive layer. An image-forming method using the light-sensitive microcapsules comprises: imagewise exposing to light the light-sensitive material; heating the material; and pressing the material on an image receiving material to transfer the color image forming substance with the unpolymerized polymerizable compound. Thus a color image is formed on the image receiving material.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,891,295 (Kakimi) and EP-A-0 237 054 disclose a light-sensitive material containing an organic solvent which is miscible with the polymerizable compound. The organic solvent is contained in microcapsules, which are different from the light-sensitive microcapsules. The organic solvent is a transfer accelerating compound which has a function of reducing the viscosity of the polymerizable compound.
FIG. 1 is a sectional view schematically illustrating the light-sensitive material disclosed in Kakimi and EP-A-0 237 054. As is shown in FIG. 1, the light-sensitive material comprises a support (11) and a light-sensitive layer (12). The light-sensitive layer (12) contains light-sensitive microcapsules (13) and other microcapsules (14). The light-sensitive microcapsules (13) contain silver halide (15), a reducing agent (16), a polymerizable compound (17) and a color image forming substance (18). The other microcapsules (14) contain a solvent (19).